Then he was coaxed into some hugs, a telling lesson for the Republican candidate to embrace a giant challenge: the gender gap.

That gap is something the Arizona senator needs to tackle, said Carly Fiorina, a McCain adviser and former Hewlett-Packard CEO.

"We need to acknowledge that it exists, and we need to be up front in saying we want to narrow that gap, we are going after the woman vote and he needs to be communicating aggressively both directly and through his surrogates with women all over this country," she said Thursday. Watch more of the interview »